Commonwealth v. Wheeler

• Citation: 91 N.E. 415,205 Mass. 384
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. WHEELER. SAME v. FOSS. SAME v. WALCOTT.
• Decision Date: 22 March 1910
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts

205 Mass. 384

91 N.E. 415

COMMONWEALTH

v.WHEELER.

SAME

v.FOSS.

SAME

v.WALCOTT.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Middlesex.

March 22, 1910.

Report from Superior Court, Middlesex County; Frederick Lawton, Judge.

Alvah G. Wheeler, William Foss, and Harry S. Walcott were separately convicted of having milk for sale which was below the statutory standard, and the cases were reported for the consideration of the Supreme Judicial Court. Verdicts sustained.

John J. Higgins, Dist. Atty., for the Commonwealth.

Herbert Parker and H. H. Fuller, for defendants.

KNOWLTON, C. J.

These are prosecutions under Rev. Laws, c. 56, §§ 56, 57, as amended by St. 1908, c. 643. The last of these sections makes punishable selling, exchanging or delivering, or having in custody or possession with the intent to sell, exchange or deliver, milk which is not of good standard quality. The amendment provides that, in prosecutions under these and certain other sections, ‘milk which, upon analysis, is shown to contain less than 12.15 per cent. of milk solids, or less than 3.35 per cent. of fat, shall not be considered of good standard quality.’ Each of the defendants admitted that, at the time alleged in the complaint, he had in his possession, with intent to sell it, certain milk which contained 11.65 per cent. of milk solids and no more. The jury found each of the defendants guilty, and the cases were reported to this court upon questions of law raised at the trial. These questions all relate to the constitutionality of the statute. They are in the form of different requests to rule that the statute is unconstitutional, and of offers of evidence which was intended to show the unconstitutionality of the law.

The sections referred to are a part of an elaborate system of legislation regulating the sale of milk, particularly directed to the prevention of the sale of adulterated or unwholesome milk. In considering these statutes we must take into account matters of common knowledge, and facts and opinions which fairly may be presumed to have influenced the action of the Legislature.

Milk is a very important article of food, which enters largely into the sustenance and development of children. It is the natural food of infants for a considerable time after their birth, and the milk of the cow is often used to supply the deficiency of milk from the mother. Probably there is no other article of diet the purity and good quality of which are so important to the life and health of the people, and especially to the life and health of the young children, as are the purity and good quality of milk. It is also very easy to adulterate it, and it may be adulterated, especially by the addition of water, in such a way that nothing but a chemical analysis will detect the adulteration. The Legislature, in the interest of public health, has enacted laws intended to enable the people to obtain milk of good quality, that is free from adulteration. No one can question the propriety of legislation upon this subject. If statutes are directed to this end, the methods adopted for accomplishing the object desired, so long as they have some manifest relation to the object, must be left to legislative determination. Not only in Massachusetts, but in several other states, the establishment of a standard founded on the quantity of milk solids and of fat contained in the milk has been adopted as the best way of preventing adulteration, and of securing for purchasers milk whose quality can be relied upon. Com. v. Keenan, 139 Mass. 193, 29 N. E. 477;Com. v. Evans, 132 Mass. 11;Com. v. Vieth, 155 Mass. 442, 29 N. E. 577;People v. Cipperly, 37 Hun (N. Y.) 319, and 101 N. Y. 634, 4 N. E. 107;State v. Smyth, 14 R. I. 100, 51 Am. Rep. 344;State v. Crescent Creamery Co., 83 Minn. 284, 86 N. W. 107,54 L. R. A. 466, 85 Am. St. Rep. 464;State v. Campbell, 64 N. H. 402, 13 Atl. 585,10 Am. St. Rep. 419. In each of the cases from other courts cited above, the constitutionality of such legislation has been affirmed. It is a familiar exercise of the police power for the prevention of fraud and the promotion of the public health. See, also, Shivers v. Newton, 45 N. J. Law, 469, Powell v. State of Pennsylvania, 127 U. S. 678, 8 Sup. Ct. 992, 1257,32 L. Ed. 253, and State v. Addington, 77 Mo. 110.

The defendants offer to prove that they did not know and had no reason to know that the milk contained less than the prescribed quantity of...